Claudina Velásquez, or: when I was 19

Image via Wikipedia This girl was murdered when she was 19.
Let's just stop here for a sec, OK? What did you do when you were 19? Think about it!
When I was 19 I moved to Budapest leaving my parents, friends and my beloved cat, Czuga (quite similar to Manda on my sidebar actually) and head of to study Hungarian language! (do not ask me why, it just happened).
When I was 19 I was young, ambitious and extremely naive, as well as positive about all the opportunities awaiting me in this huge city. I felt I have all the time of the world to enjoy myself, to establish new friendships. I was alone, but happy - crazy, independent, free...I felt in love. I was introduced to Hungarian culture and I became the insider:)
When i was 19 a whole new world of Hungarian language opened to me - we have a saying in Polish according to which every new acquired language is a new soul we are gaining - it's an old, very traditional Slavic thinking, still - there must be something to it. Hungarians originated from the very same area of Asia as my fathers ancestors (I learned about his family, Korsak, history later on) and I always felt more at home in Hungarian standards and mentality, than I did in Polish culture. I learned to compromise, and became half-a-Pole, half-a-Hungarian in temrs of my national mentality. As with this, I was experimenting with almost everything!
I felt so happy and so ful of potential! I was about to begin American Studies, Hungarian and German Major too - I was about to study languages and literature, business and philosophy - all my favourite topics! And I new I will be able to do so much with the knowledge waiting just behind the corner!
When I was 19 I felt in love with Budapest. Did you ever fel in love with a place? Did you love it trully, so blind that even the worst experience would be forgiven? At the end of the day it was us, people, not the city I could blame...
When I was 19 I used to walk all evening long throught the city at night - completely safe - crossing few bridges, visiting my favourite streets and touching my favourite stones in walls; discovering new ones...
I was all new and I was just beginning my own experience of life...I began the happiness never really demolished by anyone so far!

And this girl, who hapens to wear a T-shirt from Budapest, had a chance for the same experience. She was a student of law faculty in Guatemala. She was found dead on the 13th of August 2005. She was not as lucky as we are - born in the wrong country?
'Families seeking help from the authorities are often faced with indifference and discrimination, and a particularly worrying tendency to blame the victim's behaviour or background for their death. Claudina's father told Amnesty International "The investigator said they thought Claudina was a nobody because she was wearing sandals and a belly button ring."
Despite such obstacles, Claudina's family have been'
It is a fact that 'In 2005, 665 women were killed - 25% up on the previous year, 10 times the rate in the UK, and not one killer caught. With no fingerprint or DNA database, no crime or victim profiling and no forensic science, killers go free and witnesses do not talk.'

Claudina was a lovely young girl, full of potential and free to become whoever she wants to be, yet she was deprived her basic right - right to live.

That is the reason why I decided to run the challenge for Amnesty International and chose her story as my own. If you think I am running it for myself, you are wrong. I was misused but I am alive and I kept my faith in law, truth and independence - my own one.

I will do nything I can (and this really DOES NOT COST me a lot!) to help organisations fighting for similiar rights to be established and respected in other countries. Simply, because I am lucky and I can;)

You can help too - just donate the money you plan to spend for your evening pint to my cause instead.:) Thank you!

Sworn Virgin

Pic by DAN BILEFSKY, published here.
I am amazed by few things. Photos, blogs linking to it but first of all by the brilliant tradition of sworn virgins - society lacking men allows women to step into their roles! I swear to never have sex again, so I can have a gun and sit next to men at the wedding. My social sexuality is so well established that I make other women shy!
I must admit I am impressed. It's much better than to be a nun...
Sorry, I do not want to be sarcastic, NOT AT ALL! It really is more practical, and follows the same commitment, doesn't?

I was searching Twitter for feminist users tonight to find a few links - simply because nowadays I think about gender roles in the UK, Hungary, Poland. (for those who do not know me, I do not consider myself a feminist, but...living in the UK is easier than in Hungary for a woman - that is where my thinking comes from).
Hungary is a bizarre place - women cook, raise kids, work, men - work; nonetheless it's women who control the family life...women who historically have been obsessively independent - first kind appointed a woman (St. Mary) to be eternal queen of the country; Hungarian queen had her own residential town, library, her signature on state correspondence! Men were out fighting wars, she was raising next generations. Today men are dependent, women lack independent men (sorry, very shallow, and harshly general conclusion!) Hungarian feminists are sophisticated and scary.
Poland? I have no idea anymore. I know that with my experience of domestic abuse in my homeland I would be stygmatised, my son too. For some reason even my family assumes I have gone back to my maiden name - 'as if nothing had happened'! - which almost angers me.
UK? High rate of 30 year old males committing suicide...makes me wonder: would I like to be born a man in this country? I am more than happy to be a woman, but if I were to reverse my own experience...no, I would not. Polish feminist are activists.
I cannot see clearly what is the male model in the UK - I have not lived here long enough - but I can see already that being polite to women does not pay off: they get offended if I want to help them carrying their heavy bags or let the older ones on the bus! UK feminists seem to move towards girl power, but I do not like the stereotype of the British girl, so...

Me - as happy as I am - still miss male male model - and I think I will continue searching and appreciating those who sometimes want to take over the lead - just for a while, just to feel more useful, more masculine.

See, again...I am confident I am strong enough to let the man make his choices, to compromise. And I do have the choice. It's sad to think some women in other regions of the world do not:/

Good to browse a bit to learn more - I assume those things do not happen - if I do not read about it, I think it doesn't exist, blondie...

(shit, no matter how I tried, it all came down quite feminist, not that I care:P)

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